In the FA (Factory Automation) field, a programmable display having a function of connecting the programmable display to a control apparatus and displaying information concerning the control apparatus and a function of performing setting for the control apparatus is used. The programmable display includes a touch panel monitor having a user interface function. A user sets, using drawing software for creating screen data, positions and sizes of objects such as switches displayed on the programmable display. The user can further set, using the drawing software, functions realized by the switches on the programmable display.
There are a large number of screens displayed on the programmable display. A plurality of screens sometimes have similar functions or the same layout. When the screen data is created using the drawing software, in particular, if the number of screens is large, in some case, creation work is shared by a plurality of people or screen data in the past is diverted to create the screen data. In this case, a problem sometimes occurs in that the positions of objects slightly shift in screen data for a plurality of pages or a part of creators mistakes color designation of the objects and a color of the same object varies.
When such a deficiency in drawing occurs, the user checks positions, sizes, and functions of the objects one by one or corrects, with a manual input of the user, the deficiency using a tool including a list of positions, sizes, and functions of the objects. For example, when screen data with the number of screens of 100 pages is created but there are a plurality of screen data created in specifications of the same layout, an operator needs to manually check whether coordinates of the same object are unified among the screen data created in the specifications of the same layout and correct the coordinates one by one.
Further, when there are a plurality of project data, which are data of a collection of screen data of each programmable display, it is necessary to check each of the project data and correct screen data in the respective project data. For example, when similar screen data are created by a plurality of programmable displays, it is necessary to execute the same work on the respective project data. When a layout of a certain object is changed in one project data, if it is desired to set the same object of the other project data to the same layout, concerning the other project data, the operator needs to manually perform editing same as editing of one project data.